Henry Meyer and Ilya Arkhipov have post over at Bloomberg dealing with the mutual collapse of the ruble and possible slide of Putin’s internal credibility.

The meltdown of the ruble, which has plunged 18 percent against the dollar in the last two days alone, is endangering the mantra of stability around which Putin has based his rule. While his approval rating is near an all-time high on the back of his stance over Ukraine, the currency crisis risks eroding it and undermining his authority, Moscow-based analysts said.

There are 1011 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it’s only a hundred billion. It’s less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers.

This podcast from the Cato Institute deals with how “non-profit” schools benefit the folks who run them rather than students or the public. Schools aren’t the only non-profit businesses that function as a gravy trains for a few insiders.